Search Results (708)

This article examines how the discourse of “for your own good” functions as a moral framework through which parental violence is reinterpreted as care in Sinophone family cinema. Focusing on family-centered films as a key site of representation, we analyze how reconciliation is constructed not merely as a narrative resolution but as an ethical expectation. Drawing on theoretical perspectives from Michel Foucault and Louis Althusser, we develop the concept of “moralized parental violence” to describe how authority, discipline, and emotional control are legitimized through moral discourse. Through a typological analysis, identify three recurring models of reconciliation: deathbed reconciliation, retrospective understanding, and silent reconciliation. The study further explores works that resist reconciliation, arguing that such narratives suspend ethical closure and challenge normative expectations of forgiveness. By examining narrative structure, visual emphasis, and affective strategies, we demonstrate how cultural texts guide audience responses and shape moral interpretation. Rather than rejecting family values, this study reconsiders how ethics, power, and care are intertwined in cultural narratives and how the refusal of reconciliation opens a critical space for rethinking the limits of moral obligation. Full article

This study developed a Visitor Attraction Quality Checklist to evaluate amenity infrastructure. Seoullo 7017, an elevated linear park located in the Seoul Station area, is the study region. Drawing on the literature on urban regeneration and tourism, as well as amenity-based approaches and the quality evaluation of elevated linear parks, this study develops evaluation criteria that incorporate the physical environment and safety, accessibility and convenience, landscape and identity, and social usage and experience. By applying a longitudinal analysis, on-site qualitative evaluations were conducted between August 2017 and January 2026. The findings show that Seoullo 7017 functions well as a visitor attraction, offering high-standard safety infrastructure, cleanliness, and good esthetic value to accommodate diverse visitors. However, there is a seasonal disparity in cultural programming and limited connections to the surrounding local economy. This study also reveals that rigid planter designs, a lack of tree maintenance, and insufficient shaded areas limit spatial flexibility and visitor comfort. For Seoullo 7017 to pursue sustainability, it must refine its horticultural management, integrate with local businesses, and improve its design. The Visitor Attraction Quality Checklist serves as a longitudinal diagnostic tool for managing elevated urban linear parks as an outcome of global regeneration projects. Full article

This paper draws on Michel Foucault’s analysis of disciplinary power to examine the history of penal punishment and Buddhist chaplaincy at Lüshun Prison in Dalian during Japan’s colonial rule (1905–1945). The goal is to call into question the dominant understanding of Japanese prison system as simply an apparatus of naked colonial oppression by exploring the contradictions and limitations in the penitentiary system of Japan as an empire and a modern nation-state. The research is based on official prison documents, True Pure Land Buddhist Honganji sect archival sources, local Chinese publications, oral testimonies from the 2000s, interviews with descendants, and fieldwork at Lüshun Prison. The first part introduces the history of Lüshun Prison and the second explains the prison as a modern criminal justice institution embodying the Benthamian panopticon principle and modern disciplinary power. The third part examines the brutal corporeal punishment at Lüshun Prison and explores how the prison combined deliberate strategies of disciplining manipulation with bodily punishment to (re)create disciplined and subjected individuals. The fourth and fifth parts focus on Buddhist chaplaincy at Lüshun Prison as a disciplining practice. The fourth considers the limits of Buddhist chaplaincy by showing the depoliticized Buddhist doctrine deployed by chaplains was unable to discipline prisoners as it failed to make them repent and be loyal subjects of imperial Japan. The notion of public good used to justify Buddhist chaplaincy in Japan loses its political meaning when applied to the colonial penitentiary setting of Lüshun Prison. The fifth part further explores this ambiguity in Buddhist chaplaincy by focusing on examining the case of Ahn Jung-geun, the Korean independence activist who assassinated the Japanese statesman Ito Hirobumi and was imprisoned and executed at Lüshun Prison in 1910. Rather than transforming Ahn, prison chaplains ended up being transformed by him. This reversion betrays not just a tension between the private and the public, or the individual and the social, but at the same time a tension between the supposedly homogenized nation-state and the multi-ethnic empire. Full article

Parenting research and policy increasingly emphasize visible practices, measurable outcomes, and parental effort as indicators of competence. Across welfare, education, and family intervention contexts, “good parenting” is often evaluated through intensive doing: monitoring, documenting, optimizing development, and managing risk. While these frameworks foreground parental responsibility, they frequently obscure the relational dimensions of care and intensify existing classed, gendered, and racialized inequalities. Building on feminist scholarship that has long conceptualized parenting as relational, ethical, and socially situated, this paper develops a theoretical framework for rethinking parenting by integrating family studies scholarship on intensive parenting, emotional labor, and inequality with Hannah Arendt’s distinctions among labor, work, and action. Parenting is commonly framed as labor, the daily work of sustaining children’s lives, or as work, the longer-term project of producing competent future adults. Drawing on Arendt’s concept of action, the paper reinterprets parenting as a relational practice grounded in presence, responsiveness, and mutual recognition. Using illustrative examples from diverse family contexts, including Indigenous and immigrant communities, the analysis shows how privatized and performance-oriented models of care place strain on families while rendering collective forms of support less visible. The paper concludes by outlining implications for family research and policy, including a shift from outcome-based evaluation toward relational engagement and from individualized responsibility toward strengthened social infrastructures of care, arguing for greater attention to relational care, shared responsibility, and the structural conditions that shape parenting practices and family well-being. Full article

This article reexamines Paul’s use of athletic imagery in 1 Corinthians 9:24–27 within the broader argument of chapters 8–10. Against readings that treat the passage as a call to individual moral striving or competition for salvation, this study situates Paul’s metaphor within the honor–shame dynamics of Greco-Roman Corinth and his own defense of apostolic self-restraint. Paul’s “race” and “imperishable wreath” do not exhort believers to outperform one another but dramatize the paradox of freedom expressed through voluntary limitation. Drawing on insights from social-scientific and rhetorical criticism, the essay demonstrates that Paul’s imagery functions as the rhetorical climax of the section, translating his ethical argument into the moral grammar of the agon. By reconfiguring the contest from rivalry to service, Paul transforms the competitive ethos of Corinth into a vision of communal flourishing in which believers “compete” for the good of others. The passage thus offers a distinctly Pauline theology of self-control as the discipline of love, turning the agonistic spirit of the games into an image of the gospel itself. Full article

Hybrid desalination systems that combine osmotic and thermal driving forces offer a promising route to improve water recovery and energy efficiency for high-salinity feedwaters where conventional processes face limitations. This study presents a comprehensive mathematical modeling framework and performance analysis of a hybrid forward osmosis–membrane distillation (FO-MD) system for seawater desalination. The novel contributions include: (1) a coupled heat, mass, and solute transport model that explicitly accounts for concentration polarization, temperature polarization, reverse salt flux, and their dynamic interactions through the draw solution loop; (2) a quantitative assessment of the synergistic regeneration effect, showing how MD maintains draw solution concentration and stabilizes FO performance over time; (3) systematic evaluation of parameter sensitivity to polarization effects; and (4) comparative energy analysis quantifying specific energy consumption relative to standalone processes. Model predictions were validated against published experimental data, showing good agreement for both FO and MD fluxes (R² > 0.94). The MD flux increased from approximately 2–3 LMH at 30 °C to 17 LMH at 50 °C, confirming vapor pressure enhancement. FO water flux increased significantly with draw solution concentration from 0.2 to 1.1 M due to higher osmotic pressure differences. Time-dependent simulations of the integrated FO-MD system showed that MD regeneration reduces draw solution dilution by 60% compared to standalone FO, maintaining FO flux approximately 43% higher after 6 h of operation. Sensitivity analysis revealed that FO predictions are moderately sensitive to mass transfer coefficients (6–9% flux change for 20% parameter variation), while MD shows lower sensitivity to heat transfer coefficients (3–5%). Energy analysis indicates that FO-MD hybridization reduces thermal energy consumption by 15–40% compared to standalone MD, with specific energy consumption of 382 kWh/m³ (40.2 kWh/m³ primary energy equivalent) when using low-grade heat. The obtained results demonstrate that FO-MD hybridization enhances water recovery and operational stability compared to standalone processes, supporting its potential for energy-efficient desalination of high-salinity brines and industrial wastewaters where low-grade heat is available. Full article

This article contributes to ongoing debates between political scientists and the burgeoning civic education reform movement over the nature and goals of political inquiry and the need for a careful analysis of political methodology. To do so, this article draws on and explicates Aristotle’s criticisms of Hippodamus to show the dangers of privileging legibility and quantifiability over the common experiences of civic life, which includes normative considerations of good and bad and right and wrong. Ultimately, we argue that Aristotle provides a model for inquiring into the nature of political life that is conscious of civic responsibility and which offers a strong justification for continued civic education reform. Along the way, we contribute to ongoing discussions about the potentially positive relationship between liberal and civic education by connecting the civic education movement to modern theorizing about virtue politics. Full article

This article examines how algorithmic mediation reshapes social trust and solidarity in the post-secular age. Historically grounded in shared moral horizons shaped by religion, tradition, and communal practices, trust has increasingly been displaced by technocratic governance, market rationality, and algorithmic systems that mediate work, cognition, communication, and political life. Through a critical analysis of contemporary developments—including algorithmic labour management, neurotechnology, large language models, digital public spheres, technological sovereignty, and global AI governance—the article argues that algorithmic mediation intensifies the fragility of trust by instrumentalizing human agency, fragmenting public reason, and concentrating power within opaque technological infrastructures. Against technological determinism and purely procedural approaches to ethics, the article advances a normative framework rooted in solidarity and the common good. Drawing on post-secular perspectives, a retrieval of natural law normativity, and the resources of Catholic Social Teaching, it contends that trust cannot be sustained through efficiency, prediction, or regulation alone. Instead, social trust depends upon relational goods—dignity, responsibility, participation, and truth—that resist reduction to data-driven optimization. Reclaiming solidarity therefore requires re-embedding AI within moral horizons capable of guiding technological development toward integral human flourishing. In this sense, the governance of AI emerges not merely as a technical challenge but as a decisive moral and political task for post-secular societies. Full article

This study explores the digital competence of foreign language teachers in Bulgarian secondary education by focusing on the institutional context of which they are a part, the strengths and gaps of their competence, and their levels of competence. It draws upon empirical data that were collected and analyzed within an integrated, dual-instrument framework, combining the SELFIE (Self-reflection on Effective Learning by Fostering the Use of Innovative Educational Technologies) and SELFIE for TEACHERS (Self-reflection on Effective Learning by Fostering the Use of Innovative Educational Technologies for Teachers) EU-aligned assessment tools. The results from the questionnaire data show that the foreign language teachers state that they work in a relatively good technological environment and evaluate the usage of digital technologies for teaching and communication purposes within the school context as a salient aspect of their digital competence. The results also reveal three areas in the study participants’ digital competence that are in need of improvement: (1) empowering learners/personalizing the educational process, (2) assessment and (3) facilitating learners’ digital competence. In addition, the findings indicate that the foreign language educators rate their digital competence at a low to medium level. By blending institutional and teacher-oriented perspectives into a single integrated study of Bulgarian secondary school foreign language teachers, this investigation extends the existing research and makes evidence-based recommendations for institutional capacity building, teacher education policy and targeted professional development aimed at improving the educators’ digital competence. Full article

This study addresses a critical gap in the operationalization of sustainability frameworks at the project level by developing and validating an empirically grounded measurement instrument for assessing Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) compliance in manufacturing industry projects. While the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) articulate sustainability aspirations at the national and global level, and ESG frameworks capture organizational-level sustainability performance, no validated instrument exists for measuring ESG integration at the project level where sustainability commitments are ultimately operationalized. Drawing on the theoretical foundations of sustainable project management, stakeholder theory, and the ESG governance literature, the authors developed a 30-item survey instrument capturing six conceptual dimensions of ESG-aligned project performance. Data were collected from 2231 project sponsors and decision-makers in North American goods manufacturing firms classified under NAICS codes 31–33, which collectively encompass the entire manufacturing sector in North America. Through a sequential analytical approach employing principal component analysis (PCA) for initial item reduction, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) for dimensionality assessment, and structural equation modelling (SEM) for confirmatory validation, a parsimonious two-factor model emerged with excellent fit indices (CFI = 0.99, TLI = 0.98, RMSEA = 0.052, SRMR < 0.035). The first factor captures ESG planning activities undertaken during project initiation and planning phases, while the second factor represents ESG monitoring and controlling functions during project execution. The reduction from six theoretical dimensions to two empirical factors reflects lifecycle governance theory, where planning-phase governance and execution-phase control emerge as functionally distinct but correlated constructs. The validated instrument offers practical utility for project managers, organizational sustainability officers, and policy-makers seeking standardized benchmarks for ESG compliance at the operational project level. The validated instrument and complete survey are shared for replication and testing across different industries and countries. Full article

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is increasingly positioned as a core task of biology education; however, teachers’ conceptions often oscillate between instrumental approaches and more critical-reflective perspectives. Drawing on the theoretical distinction between instrumental (ESD 1) and critically reflective (ESD 2) ESD frameworks, this study developed and validated a questionnaire with a five-point rating scale ranging from 0 (strongly disagree) to 4 (strongly agree) to assess pre-service biology teachers’ ESD-related beliefs and tested whether the proposed approaches emerge as empirically separable dimensions. We generated an initial item pool, which was reviewed by content experts and piloted (n = 30). In Sample 1 (n = 218 pre-service biology teachers), an exploratory factor analysis with iterative item reduction yielded a nine-item, two-factor solution explaining 52.0% of the variance (KMO = 0.82; Bartlett’s test p < 0.001). The factors reflected action- and behavior-oriented beliefs and critical-reflective beliefs (emphasizing social justice, interdisciplinarity and uncertainty), showing good internal consistency (ω = 0.76/0.86). A confirmatory factor analysis in an independent Sample 2 (n = 104 biology-related students) supported the correlated two-factor model (CFI = 0.968; TLI = 0.955; RMSEA = 0.068; SRMR = 0.068; r = 0.45). By operationalizing a differentiated concept of ESD, the instrument enables quantitative research on distinct belief orientations and can support the design and evaluation of ESD-oriented teacher education programs. Full article

Pharmaceutical regulation plays a central role in protecting public health by governing clinical trials, market authorization, and post-marketing safety monitoring throughout the medicine life cycle. While substantial literature describes established systems, particularly the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Japan’s Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Agency (PMDA), and the European medicines regulatory network coordinated by the European Medicines Agency (EMA) together with national competent authorities, comparative analyses that integrate both mature authorities, emerging regulators and transnational harmonization networks remain limited. This narrative review draws on primary regulator/network documentation and targeted peer-reviewed literature to compare core regulatory functions across jurisdictions, including approval pathways and evidentiary expectations, inspection and good manufacturing practice (GMP) oversight, transparency practices, and pharmacovigilance and risk-management approaches. Across regions, we observe increasing convergence in scientific expectations through initiatives such as the International Council for Harmonisation (ICH) and reliance and work-sharing models, alongside persistent differences in legal mandates, resourcing, timelines, and data requirements. These differences are most consequential for complex products (e.g., advanced therapies) and in crisis settings, where emergency or conditional authorizations amplify the need for strong lifecycle monitoring, real-world evidence governance, and cross-border communication. We conclude by outlining opportunities to strengthen regulatory resilience and equity through fit-for-purpose harmonization, investment in enabling infrastructure, and future work on interoperable data systems, signal detection, and coordinated post-marketing evaluation. Full article

To address the challenges of excessive local thinning, poor surface quality, and low production efficiency in traditional multi-pass deep-drawn aluminum alloy fairings, this study investigates the effects of process parameters—including liquid chamber pressure, holding force, and differentiated lubrication schemes—on the liquid-filled forming performance and wall thickness distribution of a 460 × 280 × 1.5 mm thin-walled 2A12 aluminum alloy fairing. Employing an integrated liquid-filled forming technique combining a flexible punch with a rigid die, the research combines numerical simulation with experimental validation. The study demonstrates good consistency between experimental results and numerical simulations. The optimal forming process parameters are liquid chamber pressure of 10 MPa, holding force of 1100 kN, and a lubrication scheme (friction coefficients of 0.01 for the flange and forming zones and 0.06 for the transition radius zone). Under these parameters, part wrinkling and cracking are effectively suppressed, achieving optimal wall thickness uniformity in the formed parts, with a maximum thinning rate of only 6.6%. The proposed liquid-assisted forming process and differentiated lubrication scheme provide a new technical pathway for high-precision manufacturing of thin-walled complex curved components made of 2A12 aluminum alloy. Compared to traditional multi-stage drawing processes, both forming efficiency and quality are significantly improved. Full article

This article addresses a major challenge in circular economy accounting: assessing the social dimension, particularly social ties, which are often immaterial and difficult to capture. It examines a case study of how a local project managing organic waste and unsold goods fosters social ties in a priority urban neighborhood in France, and how these dynamics can be apprehended through an alternative qualitative accounting approach. The study draws on an ethnographic case of the MatOrGa project, combining participant observation, semi-structured interviews, discourse grounded analysis, and actor and flow mapping. Situated within counter-accounting and critical accounting, the research emphasizes social ties that extend beyond purely economic logic, spanning social, ecological, and economic dimensions. The new concept of counter-accounting utterances is introduced to describe empirical accounts that make visible practices, relationships, and social effects often overlooked in conventional accounting and sustainability reporting. The study shows how ethnography can function as a form of counter-accounting, producing qualitative representations of social impact that resist standardization. The findings advance social and sustainability accounting by offering a situated and reflexive approach to assessing the social impact of circular economy initiatives, while also opening the way for context-sensitive non-financial reporting. Full article

The objective of this article is to examine how alternative digital platforms can be designed and governed as public-interest infrastructures capable of supporting democratic deliberation in the contemporary digital public sphere. Drawing on deliberative democratic theory, the article develops a normative framework for evaluating participatory digital infrastructures and applies it to a qualitative, theory-driven case study of Decidim, an open-source participatory platform originally developed by the Barcelona City Council. Methodologically, the study combines normative analysis with qualitative documentary analysis of official platform documentation, peer-reviewed academic literature, and the institutional and technical features of the platform. The analysis shows that Decidim operationalises key deliberative principles—such as inclusion, publicity, reason-giving, transparency, traceability, and participatory governance—through its institutional design, governance model, and deliberative affordances. The findings demonstrate that algorithmic systems and digital infrastructures are not inherently incompatible with democratic values, but can be intentionally engineered to support public deliberation and democratic will-formation. The article concludes that the reconstruction of participatory digital infrastructures as public goods constitutes a democratic imperative, requiring sustained institutional commitment, political will, and a reconceptualisation of platform design as a domain of democratic governance. Full article